there, nor anybody! Did you save my life only to make it unbearable to me? However great the service you rendered him, Erik may end by forgetting it; and you know that nothing can restrain Erik, not even Erik himself.”
He spoke, but I had now no other wish than to know what I already called the trick of the siren. He satisfied my curiosity, for Erik, who is a real monster—I have seen him at work in Persia, alas—is also, in certain respects, a regular child, vain and self-conceited, and there is nothing he loves so much, after astonishing people, as to prove all the really miraculous ingenuity of his mind.
He laughed and showed me a long reed.
“It’s the silliest trick you ever saw,” he said, “but it’s very useful for breathing and singing in the water. I learned it from the Tonkin pirates, who are able to remain hidden for hours in the beds of the rivers.”
I spoke to him severely.
“It’s a trick that nearly killed me!” I said. “And it may have been fatal to others! You know what you promised me, Erik? No more murders!”
“Have I really committed murders?” he asked, putting on his most amiable air.
“Wretched man!” I cried. “Have you forgotten the rosy hours of Mazenderan?”
“Yes,” he replied, in a sadder tone, “I prefer to forget them. I used to make the little sultana laugh, though!”
“All that belongs to the past,” I declared; “but there is the present … and you are responsible to me for the present, because, if I had wished, there would have been none at all for you. Remember that, Erik: I saved your life!”